Architect Archive
Thread: No luck selling Architect Items
It does feel like my sales have slowed, but it could just be a market fluctuation. I think a few people have left the game recently. But just the same, as I wander near Mos Eisley (the closest starter city to me), I find brand new or very new players out and about, leveling up marksman or scout or artisan. This means more customers are in the "cooker", just waiting to be discovered.
If I wanted a burst to sales, I'd try posting my location, stock, and prices on my local trade forum. Possibly have a "grand opening" event and post that on your server forum. Even if you aren't new, just redocorate and have some silly event. It's simple marketing stuff, really. Customers are out there. You just need to let them know that you are available. And whatever you do, don't barter on your price. If you think the price is fair, hold your own. 5k or 10k credits is 10 minutes away at the nearest mission term. There's no reason you should be bending, when credits are so easy to get.
What exactly are you selling? Is it harvesters or buildings?I'd expect that the demand for buildings would be pretty slow that seems to be true on most servers. Harvester demand varies from OK to slow.
Running an ad in the trade forum is a good idea. You might put an item on sale to attract some business.
How do your prices compare to your peers?
Here are some things I do:
- register vendor on the planetary map - make sure that it tells people what to expect - so instead of the non-discript "Zalle Enterprises" that I started with, I now have "Zalle Structures" and "Zalle Furnishings"
- sell furniture on the Bazaar, and put your advert in the "description" field (I keep a bunch of stuff in MS Word and then just copy&paste it into the game), including the waypoint for your shop
- put stuff up for auction on the Bazaar with your advert in it - it lasts for 7 days (although there apparently is a way to make it longer that I haven't stumbled onto yet) - selling a sofa chair or BER4 small harvester for 100 credits is cheap compared to having everyone looking at your advert for a week
- put your shop location in your sig on the forums
- look at the trade forums and respond to requests, either in the posts, via private forum messages, or ingame
- when someone buys something from you on the Bazaar, send them a "thank you" note *WITH YOUR WAYPOINT ATTACHED* and tell them that you have more stuff on your vendor - you are handing them your "business card" so even if they didn't make note of your waypoint in the advert, now they have it
If you are going to specialize (e.g., houses, harvesters, furniture, crafting stations, whatever) then make that clear in your advert.
As a Master Architect on Valcyn, and knowing a few other masters around the traps, I can tell you that the market is definitely slowing down. I haven't been advertising very much but have still been able to make my couple of mil in sales a week - but business is slowing down.
I've discussed the situation with a few of the large resource suppliers and most of them are also finding that their sales have been down across the board since the announcement of the halting to the hologrind - so this decision is starting to bite now. You should also note that most of them are at capacity and none of the dozen I have spoken to have any intention of expanding their operations (and some are actually thinking of scaling back or just purely working for their PA or city).
The other thing you may find is that most folks are after the top of the line, or nothing - so unless you are selling BER10 Mediums and BER13 Heavies, they wont get sold. Also have a look at your pricing as well and see how competitive you are to others around you. If you are located in a big city like Bartertown, or one that has other architects, pricing is going to be all important.
And as was mentioned before, advertise on the Valcyn Trade board - but be aware that not everyone in the galaxy views it.
Hope these titbits help.
Hothman69 wrote:
Hello all. I'm a near master arch. on the valcyn server. I've got a shop set up in a player city and I havn't made a single sale in more than a WEEK!!! At this rate I'll be broke in NO time!!! Just wondering if all of you out there have had better luck. I've got more than a million in items sitting in my vendor, but no takers. I've even registered on the map. still no luck.